It didn't matter. She got to her feet and kept running, even with the chilly essence of the ghost touching the back of her neck. She hit the second stairway, and raced up it, bursting through the door at the top. The door that led to the room where the MacLellan witch had allegedly cast her deadly spell. Kira flipped the light switch, but nothing happened, so she raced to the odd little table at the room's center, and fumbled for the matches she'd seen there earlier. Wooden matches, and God only knew if they were any good. She struck one, struck it again, and again, and finally it sparked and flared. She touched it to the candles on the table, all of them, and she noted there were more than there had been before.
Frowning, she looked at the table in the dancing light of the candles. There were five of them, four forming a circle and one in the center. All black. Dishes of herbs she couldn't identify rested there too, along with a dead dove, three hat pins sticking out of its chest.
Kira caught her breath, stepping backward, away from the table.
And then she felt Miranda behind her, and turned.
Miranda stood there, staring at her. And while she was still translucent, she was also far more fully formed than before. Kira could see the waves of her hair, the tears in her eyes, the greens in the gown she wore.
"Miranda," she whispered.
"How could he? How…could…he?" the heart broken spirit whispered.
Kira stood there, frozen. "Why…don't you ask him?" she suggested.
"I've killed him. I wish he'd killed me instead. I wish he'd spared me this pain. Better he put a knife in my heart than betray me this way. I'll see to it none of my descendents ever hurt the way I do now." She looked at the table.
"No you won't." Kira swept an arm over the table, scattering the dishes of herbs. Then she snatched up the murdered dove, yanking the pins from its poor wounded breast, and racing to the doors that led onto the widow's walk, she flung them open.
"No!" Miranda cried.
Kira hovered there in the doorway with the dove's still warm, limp body in her hands. "I'll toss it unless you ask him yourself, Miranda! I will!"
"How can I? He's dead."
"So are you."
The wraith went silent, her eyes seeming to focus inwardly. She remained that way for a long moment.
"You're dead, too, Miranda. You took your own life, and you died in pain and anguish. But before you did, you cursed your entire family. No MacLellan woman has known love since. The few who've tried have died at the hands of their husbands. The rest are too afraid to give love a chance. You're destroyed your daughters, and theirs after them, for generations to come. And soon the line will die out. All because of your actions that night."
The ghost's brows rose, her eyes lowered, her head moved slowly from side to side.
"Talk to your husband, Miranda. Call out to him. He'll hear you, I know he will."
The winds of the storm raged on. Lightning flashed, and the curtains flew as the rain slashed inward.
"Victor?" Miranda whispered on a broken plea. "Can you hear me?"
To Kira's amazement, a form appeared in the room then. A man's form. He took shape slowly, growing more solid before her eyes. Two of the candles went out as the wind-driven rain spat at them.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"Victor, why? Why?"
"I got very drunk, my love. I was missing you, and drinking, and she came to our room. I took her into my arms, thinking it was you. And even as I realized in my drunken state that she was not my beloved bride, you burst into the room on us. You never gave me a chance to explain."
Miranda's form fell to its ghostly knees, her head lowering, sobs wracking her frame. "But I…I k-k-killed you!"
"I forgive you, my love. I forgave you long ago. And I've waited, all this time, for you to forgive me, and yourself, to free yourself of the bondage you created for your soul, and to join me on the other side."
Her head came up slowly. Kira felt tears pouring from her own eyes as it did.
"You forgive me?"
"I love you, lass. It's unendin' what I feel for you. Let it go, my beautiful Miranda." He held out a hand. "Join me, my love. I've missed you so."
Rising slowly, Miranda lifted her hand and took a single step toward him.
"Wait!" Kira cried. "Wait, please. Remove the curse first."
Both heads turned toward her. Miranda nodded slowly, and held out a hand. "Give the dove to me."
Swallowing hard, Kira handed her the lifeless bird, feeling the cold touch, like heavy fog, touching her hand as Miranda took it from her. Cupping it between her ghostly hands, Miranda bent her head close to the bird, whispered something, and then straightening, she moved to the open doors, lifted her hands, and opened them.
The dove soared from her palms, and even as it entered the storm, the winds died. The rain ceased. The lightning and thunder ended. Kira stared skyward as the black clouds skittered away, making a clear path to the new moon that was a thin silver sickle in the sky.
"Thank you, Miranda," Kira whispered. "Thank you."
She turned to look at the couple, but there was no one there. It was over. It was honestly over.
And then she remembered. Ian!
Racing from the room, and down the stairs, she headed through the hallway, and saw him lying on the landing below. Rushing down to him, she took his shoulders, pulling him upright. "Ian, darling, are you all right? Talk to me! Please?"
He lifted his head, blinking at her as she searched his face. "I'm…fine. I think. What happened?"
"It's over, Ian. It's over, the curse is broken."
"Thank the Lord," he muttered, and pulling her into his arms, he lay back down, snuggling her close, right there on the floor. "Now let's go back to sleep, love."
Kira frowned, because she wasn't lying on the stair landing. She was in the bed, in the same bedroom where they'd fallen asleep. Ian had rolled onto one side, and was breathing deeply, steadily. Sound asleep.
Kira threw back the covers. She was naked, not wearing Ian's shirt. It was on the floor right where it had been before.
She got up and put it on now, then looked around the room. The windows were not smashed in. There was no rain. The storm outside had abated. The bedroom door was still closed.
She opened it and stepped out into the hall, trying a light switch. It worked fine, flooding the corridor with light. Kira traversed it, seeing no shotgun lying on the floor near the top of the stairs.
She kept going, to the second staircase, and up it, to the spell room at the top. Its door opened easily, its light switch also in working order. The table in the room's center was empty, except for the thick coating of dust, the two candles and the matchbook that had been there earlier in the day. The doors to the widow's walk were closed. But she could see the sliver of moon just as she had seen it before.
Had it all been a dream? Was the curse truly broken?
She left the room, shutting off its light and closing its door, then headed all the way down to the first floor, to the living room. The fire she'd left burning there was only a soft bed of red-orange coals now. Again, she turned on the lights, and again, they worked as they should.
Then she stood, staring up at the gun, that hung right where it should have hung, above the mantel. And above that the portrait was just as it had been before.
Or was it?
Kira moved closer, staring up at the painting. No, she realized, it wasn't the same. The couple—their eyes were different. And their mouths. It seemed they were almost smiling now.
Something tapped the window behind her and she turned quickly, startled.